


Two decrees from the desk of the king

by Roga



Series: Three Tales of Documents found in Ancient Persia [3]
Category: Megilat Ester | Book of Esther, Tanakh
Genre: Collection: Purimgifts Day 3, Community: purimgifts, Documentation, Female Characters, Female Friendship, Gen, Multimedia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-03-21
Updated: 2008-03-21
Packaged: 2017-12-12 23:41:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/817401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roga/pseuds/Roga
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zeresh and Vashti have a chat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Two decrees from the desk of the king

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Shay (Shayheyred)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shayheyred/gifts).



> Many thanks to [](http://miss-porcupine.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://miss-porcupine.livejournal.com/)**miss_porcupine** for helping me brainstorm various graffiti slogans! We are quite the vandalists.

A tall oak stands in the center of Zeresh’s garden, pouring shade over the carpets and cushions she’s placed on the ground. Cool spring winds break the heat in the air, and Vashti is grateful for having this spot in a city that has spit her out from within it, though she would never say it aloud.

Zeresh sits down besides her, handing Vashti a goblet of thinned wine. “Well, your husband’s gone and done it this time,” she says.

“Ex-husband,” Vashti corrects. The runners have just returned from their voyages; by now the decree will have spread to all one hundred and twenty seven kingdoms. She knows it by heart. She refuses to feel guilty.

_I am Xerxes, the great king, king of kings, king of all countries, king of the world, son of king Darius, the Achaemenid. The great king Xerxes says: From this day every man shall bear rule in his own house, and all the wives will give to their husbands honor, both great and small._

“I suppose it could have been worse,” Zeresh sighs.

“Yes,” Vashti says dryly. “They could have blamed us for being the source of all evil.”

Zeresh laughs. The wind ruffles the wisps of black hair that escape from beneath her veil.

“One day,” Vashti starts, but does not finish the sentence. One day they will be more than bodies, she wants to say, but cannot promise.

*

Summer and winter and spring go by, and Haman’s position rises in court, but the tall oak is still there; Zeresh has not moved into his quarters at the palace. “Beer?” she offers Vashti, and Vashti accepts the chalice with both hands, takes a long, thirst-quenching sip.

The news arrived that morning. Or left that morning, it should be said, for it was in Shushan, in this very courtyard, perhaps, that the order had originated. Neat black words on crisp, clean scroll: _destroy_ and _slay_ and _perish_ , _young and old, women and children_. Take the spoils of the Jews.

As if they have anything to give. Ahasueros acts as if his vizier were king and not he, and forgets that his ancestors built a stable empire based on subjects content enough not to rebel, and not on petty, personal vengeance. On wars and exiles, not mass murder.

“So how are you today?” Zeresh asks.

“Oh, you know,” Vashti replies conversationally. “Still banished. Has it perhaps escaped your attention that your husband is a megalomaniac psychopath?”

Zeresh doesn’t even blink. “Ah, that. It has not.”

“Just making sure.” Vashti takes another sip. “You could try doing something, you know.”

“Like what? According to the law, I must honor and obey.” Vashti lifts an eyebrow, because she _knows_ Zeresh. But Zeresh just shrugs. “Look, if it were up to me, I’d tell him to go hang himself.”

There is no love lost between Zeresh and her husband, who provides her with food and sons and little else. Zeresh is cruel and manipulative and a master at concealing her emotions, and Vashti thinks there might be hope for this empire after all.

Not that she cares or anything.

*

“So do we hate her?” Zeresh asks, on the second day in a row in which Haman is invited to a private banquet by the queen.

Vashti replies, “It isn’t so much a question of ‘do we’, but rather ‘how much’. I, for example, hate her as much as the grains of sand between here and Persepolis. A fair amount, I believe.”

“You do not hate her.” Zeresh narrows her eyes. “You envy her.”

“I hate her. And pity her.”

“You hate _him_.”

“Won’t argue about that,” Vashti murmurs.

“Invites him over every night,” Zeresh says darkly. “And I’ve heard the king grants her anything she wishes.”

“I’ve heard she hasn’t eaten in three days,” Vashti adds. “What, is she trying to lose weight?”

Zeresh’s mouth twitches. “Now you’re being petty.”

“No, being petty would be explaining what Ahasuaros’s big wand is compensating for on the walls of the palace,” and the moment the words come out of her mouth, she knows she actually will.

*

The next day is chaos. Improvised trials and executions, and apparently Mordechai the Jew has saved the Jewish day, and the queen is revealed to be a Jewess, and it is all about the Jews, Jews, Jews.

The city center is crowded, and nobody pays attention to the writing on the wall, but Vashti feels a spark of satisfaction to see that it’s still there anyway, for all of Shushan to see:

AHASUAROS HAS A REALLY TINY DICK.

And then she blinks in surprise. Sometime between the middle of the night and now, someone had added, beneath her own words:

HE REALLY, REALLY DOES.

She cannot help but be astonished, because it can’t be, it cannot be – but the number of literate people in the palace is not so high that she can’t venture an educated guess. So she searches the crowd, and for a single moment, her eyes meet the queen’s.

And the queen _winks_.

It is only for a moment, so brief that Vashti thinks she might have imagined it, but she knows she did not. She doesn’t even know how the queen could have recognized her — Vashti is wearing a thick black veil – but clearly she did, and apparently, the queen has more in her then Vashti has given her credit for. Possibly even a soul.

Suddenly, Ahasueros’s grip on Esther’s shoulder does not seen protective, but stifling. The crowds, in their commotion, are forming rings and rings around Their Majesties, and when the mob starts getting rowdy – as mobs tend to do – a group of guards quickly gather around the queen, ready to escort her back to the palace.

For the first time since she was banished, Vashti feels free.

*fin*

 

 

  
**GRAFFITI FOUND ON A WALL IN ANCIENT PERSIA:**

  
**MORE GRAFFITI FOUND ON A WALL IN ANCIENT PERSIA:**

  



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